October 6, 2006

So much for feeling better. I think I have had a relapse and Aidan is blowing his nose every two seconds. We didn't let that get too much in the way yesterday. While we relaxed, well slept, in the morning, we got to explore Rüdesheim in the afternoon. We boarded a train, much like the type they use at home, well actually better covered, and were taken through the picture postcard town to Siegfried's Music Museum. It had over 350 mechanical musical instruments from barrel organs to music boxes and everything in between. It was fascinating. I ended up purchasing an egg music box because I was just so impressed with the place. It really made me want to get a Christmas music box with a song from the ‘Nutcracker’ but there wasn't a nice enough one that I could find at the time.We walked about looking for the regular stuff -- postcards, a book, and an added item -- the Bride's Christmas ornament set. We only found the postcards. We went down one street and found a place with the lot of wooden carved items. Aidan liked a particular nativity set, but they were attached to a rock. After walking about for another 15 minutes, we finally went back to the store and found that he could buy the set without the rock. Aidan set it up as soon as we got back to the cabin -- he knows exactly where he wants to put it for Christmas. At the same shop, I found gifts for my team in the office.We sailed down the romantic Rhine looking at castles and hearing about the fabulous legends of the area. The Loreley legend was the most familiar to me, but there were legends connected to almost every castle. And many of these castles were fairytale quality! The countryside was amazing with the vines and the colorful houses and the castles on the hills. During dinner we docked in Koblenz. We went for a walk around the town. If we visited Koblenz during the day it could have been what the Australians called an ABC tour – Another Bloody Church/Castle. It was indeed a pretty church from the outside. Everything else was bars and restaurants -- then again, it was after 8:30 p.m. We decided to head back to the ship and spend the time instead in the hot tub. We then watched ‘Monsters Inc” before turning in. The Rhine is pretty rough right now and has a lot of traffic. That with being sick made for a somewhat restless night. Still, we're ready to discover what Cologne has to offer tomorrow.